Independence Day - Part I

We began the transition from Remembrance Day to Independence Day with a festive prayer service held by the Bnei Akiva alumni association in Jerusalem. The room was full of relatively recent immigrants to Israel from different countries around the world. This made the service seem far more meaningful than it might have otherwise, as all of those present truly felt an emotional attachment to the creation and maintenance of the the State.

After the service and dinner, we walked to Kikar Zion, a square at the bottom of Ben Yehuda street and at the center of town. There we were met by mobs of other celebrants, many wearing blue and white and the younger attendees spraying shaving cream and silly string in the air. All of the streets had been closed to car traffic, and a massive stage was set up and performers helped turn the jostling crowd into a mosh pit. The area quieted down when a fantastic laser and firecracker show began, and all eyes were glued to the skies as the explosions signaled the start of the celebration.

A few blocks away we soon found ourselves at Kikar Safra, the square we'd visited earlier in the day for a sombre ceremony. Now the venue was full of plastic chairs, video screens, and speakers, and everyone there was singing along to Israeli music composed and popularized over the last century. At 11:30 the chairs were cleared away and the vast area became crowded with people eager to celebrate the birthday of Israel with a throwback to the days of the kibbutz - Israeli folkdancing. For hours on end the hundreds of people in the square formed arbitrary circles and pranced, twirled, and Yemenite-lefted; if the dancers had worn tembel-hats and shorts instead of kippot and pants, we could easily have been looking at 1948 and not 2008. We left at 2 a.m., but the party was still going strong.